


Challenges

by thisprettywren



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: M/M, Predicament Bondage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-19
Updated: 2011-02-19
Packaged: 2017-10-15 19:11:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/164054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisprettywren/pseuds/thisprettywren
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff"><p>For <a href="http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/6375.html?thread=29519079#t29519079">this</a> very simple prompt on <span class="ljuser ljuser-name_"><a href="http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/profile"><img/></a><b><a href="http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/">sherlockbbc_fic</a></b></span></p></blockquote>





	Challenges

“You said it was for a case,” Sherlock said petulantly, standing in the doorway to Lestrade’s flat, arms crossed in annoyance.

“Yes I did, and it is.”

“An old case. Which I’ve solved for you already.”

“Which you’ve _lost_ for us, unless I can find something in these transcripts that gives us probable cause for a warrant to search his garage again,” Lestrade said, exasperated. “And, since you’re the one who broke in and analysed the oil stain in the first place, you’re going to help me find justification for us to do it again. _Legally_ , this time.”

Sherlock swept the rest of the way into the room and threw himself heavily into a chair, draping his legs over the armrest and flopping his head back dramatically. “Dull. Don’t you have clerks or someone to do that for you?”

“Do you have any idea what it would cost us in overtime to have a clerk to sort through all these?“ Lestrade waved a hand at the pile of papers on his desk, then ran it over his face.

He wasn’t sure what he’d expected, honestly, when he’d texted Sherlock to ask for his help. But he’d been frustrated at the thought of losing yet another Friday night to paperwork, at the necessity of unsnarling yet another mess that bloody man had caused by rushing in and stomping all over proper procedure. They’d almost been forced to release the suspect on a technicality, and it had only been by a bit of luck that he’d been able to keep the little thug in custody over the weekend. If they couldn’t turn up something more solid by Monday, though, they’d lose him altogether.

“Look, maybe just as a personal favour?” he tried. Sherlock huffed a laugh through his nose. Yeah; he hadn’t really expected that one to work.

Lestrade sighed and sat down at his desk, trying to focus on the transcript in front of him. Sherlock was right, it really was incredibly dull. But Donovan was visiting her sister that weekend, and he really didn’t want to ask one of the junior officers to give up their Friday evening for something like this—most of them resented Sherlock enough already as it was—and besides, he’d half-hoped Sherlock would turn up and commit one of his typical acts of brilliance, and then maybe they’d get a curry and salvage a nice evening out of it.

It had been too much to expect, though. That was obvious.

“We could still make a nice evening out of it.” The voice was low in his ear, and _Christ_ , it was unnerving when he did that. Lestrade hadn’t even heard the other man come up behind him.

“We can,” he said with all the reasonable, bored authority he could muster, “if you would just help me get through all this. It’d go much more quickly with two sets of eyes.”

“Admit it,” Sherlock said, his hand running forward over Lestrade's shoulder, down along the side of his ribcage. His breath was hot on the back of Lestrade’s neck, and _oh,_ he was in one of those _those_ sorts of moods. “You need me.”

“No more than you do me,” Lestrade said, pushing back from his desk and turning around to face him. The pale eyes were just inches from his own. “Though you could help, as it’s your mess I’m cleaning up.”

“ _Need me_ ,” Sherlock said again, voice even lower and breathy with want. Then his mouth was on Lestrade’s, warm and wet, and really, this was much better than reading Bowers’ rambling denials that he’d been the one to commit the string of B&E’s in Bishopsgate, but—

“Later,” Lestrade breathed into his mouth, because he had at least _some_ sense of propriety and, occasional appearances to the contrary, the job came first.

But Sherlock was pulling him to his feet and pushing him backward until his back pressed against the wall, the long-fingered hands insistent on his shoulders. Not for the first time Lestrade found himself surprised by the other man’s wiry strength. And then he stepped back and, _God,_ there was that infuriatingly smug grin and he was dangling Lestrade’s own handcuffs from his fingertip.

“Or _now_ ,” Sherlock said insistently, eyes growing fractionally darker. “I’ll even let you—“

Lestrade lunged forward before allowing himself to think about what he was doing, grasping Sherlock’s arm and twisting so the other man ended with his chest pressed against the wall, arm pressed into the small his back. He took the handcuffs and closed one circlet firmly around the thin wrist, ignoring the smirk of triumph Sherlock threw over his shoulder.

“You won’t _let_ me do any damn thing,” he said into Sherlock’s ear, grabbing the other wrist and securing it to the first.

It was an abuse of police property.

They’d committed it before.

He spun Sherlock again so his back was to the wall, arms trapped behind him. Sherlock drew in a sharp breath as Lestrade’s fingers immediately went to work unbuckling his belt. He could feel the pressure of Sherlock’s erection through the fabric of his trousers as he pulled the belt free.

It occurred to him that Sherlock might possibly actually murder him for what he was about to do.

God help him, but in that moment he didn’t even care.

Sherlock’s trousers fell to the floor in a puddle of fabric. Lestrade pulled his pants down as well and Sherlock stepped neatly out of them as he began to follow Lestrade the few feet toward the bedroom, a smile of anticipation playing at the corners of his mouth and tightening the skin around his eyes.

In the doorway of the bedroom, Lestrade stopped them. Sherlock leaned down for a kiss and Lestrade let him get away with it, for a moment. Then he moved behind Sherlock and tugged the chain connecting the cuffs upward, forcing Sherlock’s hands up between the sharp edges of his shoulderblades, palms together like a yogi. He looped the belt through the chain and then, before the other man had a chance to register what was happening, around the pull-up bar mounted in the doorframe.

He buckled the belt and Sherlock was trapped, arms pinned high against his back.

Sherlock gave a growl in his throat and tugged, but everything held. Lestrade knew the bar was secure; he used it nearly every morning. He also knew it would take Sherlock’s long, agile fingers no time at all to manoeuvre the belt around so that he could undo the buckle and free himself.

Best give them something else to do, then.

Rummaging in the pocket of his own trousers, Lestrade turned up two 20p pieces. He placed one between the tips of Sherlock’s index fingers, the other between the pads of his thumbs, so that he was forced to keep his hands together to hold them in place.

“If you drop those,” he said, “I will leave you in those cuffs all night, and I won’t touch you.” Sherlock snorted derisively. “And,” he added, “I won’t call you in on any cases for a _week_.”

Lestrade thought that last threat was the one that encapsulated their entire relationship. They both knew that, if there were a case on which the Yard really _needed_ Sherlock’s help, it would go right out the window, just as they both knew that Lestrade often called Sherlock in on cases on which his help wasn’t really necessary, as a means of keeping him entertained. The latter type, Lestrade would—had, in the past—stop including him in without hesitation.

Neither of them would have admitted to either of these things, and not for the same reasons.

Regardless, it worked. Sherlock was holding himself perfectly still, watching Lestrade cautiously.

Lestrade glanced down and was glad to see that Sherlock’s erection hadn’t flagged. He indulged himself in running the back of a nail up the underside. It jumped under his touch and Sherlock closed his eyes, drawing a breath and pressing his hips forward slightly, obviously labouring under the idea that the recreational portion of the evening was about to commence.

Well, that both was and wasn’t true.

Lestrade withdrew his hand and went to the kitchen, returning with two copies of the phone directory (he _knew_ there was a reason he hadn’t yet binned last year’s), each several inches thick, and Sherlock’s scarf.

Sherlock’s eyes were open again. He looked worried. Or, rather, he looked extravagantly haughty, which meant he _felt_ worried and was trying to hide it.

Good.

Lestrade knelt down and placed the directories on the floor about a foot wider than Sherlock’s hips on either side, guiding each of Sherlock’s feet out and onto them. The covers were laminated and the pages printed on cheap paper; Sherlock’s stance slid gratifyingly almost immediately. Perfect. The unsteadier, the better.

Standing again he moved to Sherlock’s back. The coins were still trapped as he’d left them, and Lestrade stroked one pale finger. Sherlock’s hand jumped slightly. “Don’t drop them,” he warned.

Reaching up, he pulled the belt two notches tighter, which elicited a gasp from Sherlock as his shoulders were rotated painfully upward. He instinctively raised himself onto the balls of his feet to relieve the pressure, slipping slightly on the laminated surface of the phone directories as they shifted beneath him. Lestrade smiled slightly as he fastened the buckle of the belt, pleased at having caught the other man off guard.

Moving back around so Sherlock could see him, he unbuttoned Sherlock's shirt and pushed it open. It revealed the pale skin of his torso stretched tight over his ribs, the concavity of his stomach moving in time with his already-rapid breath.

Sherlock didn’t speak, waiting for him to make the next move. Lestrade could practically hear the whir of Sherlock’s thoughts as he assessed his situation. Balancing in this position would quickly become difficult. He could step off the phone directories to bring his legs together and ease the strain in his calves and feet, but the drop in height would put increased pressure on his shoulders. He’d have to make a choice (several choices, again and again), alternating between two types of discomfort, complicit in whichever one his body was subjected to at any given moment.

Lestrade smiled at him before reaching up to wrap Sherlock’s scarf around his eyes. The loss of sight would make balancing more difficult and wreak minor havoc on his sense of time. _Couldn’t have him getting bored, after all,_ Lestrade thought with that peculiar mix of exasperation and admiration that usually translated as affection in this unusual relationship.

When it was secure, he bent down to run a finger along the arch of Sherlock’s foot and up the inside of his calf, feeling the flex in the muscle there. Sherlock jumped at the touch and had to fight to regain his footing, groaning at the wrench in his shoulders.

“Greg,” he said, and there was a hint of uncertainty in his voice.

“Lestrade, when I’m working,” he answered, and Sherlock sucked in a breath, understanding. “As I said, I need to finish reviewing these files. If you aren’t going to help, I think it’s rather in your best interest that you keep your mouth shut and let me concentrate, don’t you?”

* * *

It took just over three quarters of an hour to find what he was looking for in the transcript: an offhand reference to a storage chest that, if interpreted loosely, would give them probable cause for the warrant that would get them back into the garage, where they could obtain a legal duplicate of the swab Sherlock had used to prove Bowers’ guilt.

Every few pages he’d get up from his desk and walked over to check on Sherlock, run his hand along the stretched skin-muscle-bone of his torso, tease along his hipbones or the inside of his thighs. The other man remained obediently silent, but it hadn’t taken long before he was sweating and gasping. A quiver had started in his calf muscle and spread upward, so that by the time Lestrade set aside the transcripts Sherlock’s whole body seemed to be shaking with strain. He was favouring the tiptoe position, Lestrade noted with some interest, seeming to prefer the active pain of overworked muscles to the passive pain of the pull on his shoulders. Even so, the intervals between changes were getting shorter, and the cuffs were leaving nasty bruises that would show for some time against the pale wrists.

He was back up on tiptoe when Lestrade came over to him for the final time. He also hadn’t dropped the coins, though they served little purpose by that time; Lestrade knew the muscles of his arms were too exhausted to allow him the slack he’d need to twist the belt in any case. When he reached around to take them, Sherlock’s fingers clenched reflexively. They were red and slightly swollen from the pressure of the cuffs, but apparently hadn’t lost sensation.

Lestrade pressed himself lightly against Sherlock’s back. “Found what I needed,” he whispered in Sherlock’s ear, “without you.” Sherlock groaned, one foot slipping slightly as the pressure disrupted his precarious balance. Lestrade knelt down and ran his fingers up the insides of the shaking legs, pressingly lightly into the hard knots of the muscle in his calves. Sherlock slipped in earnest, breath catching as his feet thudded to the floor and the belt pulled painfully against his shoulders.

“Should’ve just helped me look,” Lestrade said reasonably, standing again to untie the scarf around Sherlock’s eyes and edging around to face him. When the pale eyes blinked open they were unfocused, the lashes damp, but they met Lestrade’s almost immediately.

“Wouldn’t have been much of a challenge,” Sherock managed hoarsely, and Lestrade could see him fighting for control of his features.

“No, probably not,” he conceded, “and you do love a challenge, don’t you.”

It seemed he did, too, if the state of his erection could be considered any indication. Lestrade reached down to make a fist around it, running his thumb along the glans, and a moan escaped Sherlock’s lips as his eyes fell closed. He was trying to move himself upward again, to relieve his shoulders.

Lestrade didn’t help. He ran the fingers of one hand along the tendons standing in the side of the long neck, keeping the other fisted lightly around Sherlock’s cock. He leaned in to press his lips lightly below Sherlock’s jaw.

“You’re gorgeous like this,” he said, lips ghosting against the spot on the pale skin where the flutter of Sherlock’s pulse was visible. “Working so hard for me. Because you need what I can give you.” He squeezed his fist quickly, eliciting a long sighing moan. “The work.”

Sherlock had managed to get his feet back up and was straining upward on his toes again, breath coming in shuddering gasps, deep tremors running up the muscles of his legs. He’d been impressively resilient so far, but Lestrade wasn’t sure how much longer he’d be able to keep this up without his calf muscles giving way altogether; best to speed things along, in that case.

He withdrew his hands from Sherlock’s skin and the other man moaned in frustration. He stepped back and placed one hand against the tightness at the front of his own trousers, holding it there until Sherlock opened his eyes, waiting to make sure the other man could see it before he spoke.

“I could leave right now to go take care of this,” he said. “Leave you here. Or make you watch while I bring myself off, and you’d keep working for me. For no reason other than that I like to see you do it. And because you don’t have a choice.” Sherlock bit his lip but didn’t turn his eyes away. “Because you need it.”

Sherlock’s breath caught as he stepped down again; Lestrade really did need to hurry.

“How long do you think you’d last,” he asked, “without me?”

Sherlock’s eyes fluttered closed. Lestrade could have been talking about his current situation, how long he’d be able to maintain himself in anything other than complete agony, but they both knew he wasn’t; the truth was, Sherlock did need him, needed him for access to the only thing that made his life bearable. It was what had been between them when this all started, back when he was trying to pull himself together enough to get off the cocaine. He might be a genius, he might be extraordinary, he might be—well, any of the things that he undeniably _was_ —but without what Lestrade could provide, Sherlock lost the core of who he was. He lost his stage, his audience, himself.

And Sherlock, who was so in control of so much in his life, _loved it_. Loved that Lestrade recognised and understood his dependence in such a fundamental area, that he acknowledged it and accommodated it, and it was that acknowledgement and accommodation that made it bearable, made it a turn-on. Because he might need Lestrade, but Lestrade understood and was willing to let himself be used to serve that need, and if _that_ wasn’t some kind of reciprocal genius mindfuck puzzle to work out—

Lestrade knelt down in front of Sherlock, helped him reposition his feet. He positioned his mouth just out of reach of the tip of Sherlock’s erection, breath hot against the moisture there when he whispered, “Admit it. You need me.”

“I _do,_ I need you, _please_ , just— _fuck_ —“

It did things to him, hearing those words from such an eloquent mouth. Sometimes he thought he did all this just for those moments, when he got to witness Sherlock come apart at his core, when they both knew the role he played in holding Sherlock together.

Lestrade slicked his fingers in his own mouth, reaching around to press them against Sherlock’s opening. It would burn, but Sherlock liked it better that way, when it went like this; he pressed the tip of one finger in and Sherlock moaned, pushing his hips back slightly, aching legs fighting keep his body steady.

Lestrade leaned forward slightly, taking just the very tip of Sherlock’s erection between his lips so that he had to press himself forward for more friction; when he did, his feet slipped, and he shouted at the sudden wrench in his shoulders before he righted himself.

He pressed in just a little more firmly with his finger, finding that little knot of tissue and crooking his finger against it slightly, and Sherlock shuddered forward and almost lost his balance altogether. From there it was a mad balancing act, Lestrade playing him forward and backward with fingers and tongue as he fought to maintain his balance and manage the pain in his muscles. Lestrade kept his mouth just far enough away that Sherlock couldn’t quite get the depth he needed and stay on his toes at the same time, and he could feel the shuddering of his muscles as Sherlock tried—and failed—to establish some kind of equilibrium, unraveling himself in the process.

Finally he heard Sherlock say, “Greg, _please,_ ” in that hoarse, wrecked voice he knew meant he was at his limit, and relented.

“Well then,” he said, and leaned forward to take Sherlock fully into his mouth. After that it was a matter of moments until he was swallowing through Sherlock’s release, using his hands to support some of Sherlock's weight as he shuddered and stumbled to completion.

Getting the belt undone was a bit tricky, so much so that at one point Sherlock made a noise that was worryingly like a sob, but one way or another they ended up on the bed, Lestrade sitting against the wall and Sherlock lying with his head in his lap.

Lestrade ran one hand through Sherlock’s hair, using the other to unlock the cuffs. “Sorry about that, mate,” he said, confronted by the state of the wrists underneath. “I’ll put something on them for you.”

Sherlock didn’t open his eyes, but managed a small laugh. “No, that was. Um. It was good. Interesting. Don’t worry about the skin, it’ll mend.”

Lestrade smiled. He’d insist on some ointment anyway, or John would have his hide. “Worth it, then?”

“Absolutely.” He stretched languorously and groaned. “Though also downright sadistic. You should be worried I’ll get ideas.”

“‘Get’? I’m sure you already have them, and it _does_ worry me.”

Sherlock chuckled. “Fair enough. And I do,”—he peeled open one pale eye and used it to aim a meaningful look in Lestrade’s direction—“which is why this doesn’t work like that.” The eye slid shut again.

It was an uncharacteristically explicit acknowledgment, coming from him, and it sent a pang of affection through Lestrade’s chest. He ran his hand up the long curve of Sherlock’s spine, fingers stroking the sore muscles at the back of his neck.

“You can come with us tomorrow,” he said on impulse, “when we go back to search Bowers’ digs.”

“After all that?” Sherlock’s tone was skeptical.

 _Because of all that_ , Lestrade thought, but couldn’t say it. “Already done the damage control,” he offered instead. “And you can’t get up to too much with half the squad right there.”

It would always be like this, with Sherlock: infuriating and amazing and confusing, too much overlap between the personal and the job, though he would at least do them both the kindness of not spelling it out quite that way. He could live with it, Lestrade decided, not for the first time. Live with this.

It was dysfunctional and broken and it _worked_.

Lestrade wasn’t certain what “it” was, though. Maybe this. Maybe Sherlock.

The man in question had, at that moment, a very disconcerting smile plastered across his face.

“‘Can’t get up to too much,’” he echoed, his voice tinged with humour. “That, Greg, sounds far too much like a challenge.”

**Author's Note:**

> For [this](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/6375.html?thread=29519079#t29519079) very simple prompt on [](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/profile) **[sherlockbbc_fic](http://sherlockbbc-fic.livejournal.com/)**


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